Ignite
by Fencing Supplies
Summary: Igneel is an allusive character. Perhaps we ought to get to know him? All but glimpses at a life that spans, at its shortest, a few millennia.
1. Iamatology

Iamatology: the branch of medicine that deals with remedies.

Igneel's father was known as the dragon of remedies. His mother was called the dragon of decay. His father healed and solved, while his mother broke and dismantled. Not as opposite as dragon mates can come, at least these two had their similarities, such as their shared love for jasmine tea and particularly gruesome jokes. Also, on a deeper leave, they were both dragons of the earth and also belonged to the same subclass, that of the replenishers.

His father harnessed the power of the earth in the form of medicines and poisons. His mother dealt with the end of the earth's cycle…but also the beginning.

His father was what they called back then a "second order" dragon. He was not a force, he was a craft. He harnessed the power of others, refining them. Could the world continue without him? Yes, yes it could.

His mother, she was a first order dragon, she was a force (and one to be reckoned with). She worked in close association with the dragon of the end and the dragon of the dead, both feared, ancient beasts. She was responsible for the removal of what the dead left remaining, the wealth in the soil and the growth on the earth. Could the world continue without her? No, no it could not.

His parent's first clutch produced two strong female earth dragons. The next wielded just him alone.

He quickly became an oddity, an orange egg shell? Curious. Red scales? Odd. Did not get burned when he feel into his father's raging fire pit? Strange.

A star dragon, from two earths? Surely...- surely not!

But he was.

His mother had been quite ashamed of birthing a child who was very much, in every possible way, an enemy in those times of hostilities between the dragons families.

But Igneel's father saw the logic. He used fire to boil his potions and the intellectual dragon knew what good its heat served the sick. He had seen charred landscapes suddenly pop with new life, as if the trees were waking up, thankful for the burn, and having their first good morning stretch in decades.

The father tried to let his son know that he was not wrong, no, he was so amazingly right that the brilliance of it still continues to astonish the old dragon of remedies to his last day.

Eventually the dragon of the light came and took Igneel away on behalf of the star dragons. It had been a tense exchange; the two fractions of dragon kind were at war so pleasantries did not come lightly.

For Igneel's first century of life, he was known only as 'that one star born from the two earths'.

Igneel did not mind much though, he did not even care. His father had told him that he made perfect sense, and he happened to believe that weathered voice. The young star boy's that Igneel shared a nest with made fun of him, but that was soon settled with a flying tackle and rough play that left them all best friends and Igneel their somehow-it-just-happen-like-that leader.

Besides, it couldn't be avoided. In the disdainful words of the star delegate that came to collect Igneel, "how else will the runt child learn to shine?"

To which the dragon of remedies had hissed,

"My son does not shine he _scorches_."

That was Igneel's first memory, a commoner earth dragon spitting in the face of star nobility. Dust flying up and billowing around his father as he tried to struggle out of the hold of some others. The sun had been glaring that day, sitting right behind his father's snarling head. Igneel thinks that it might be the reason he turned out so much more…irrepressible…than that of the dragons he grew up beside.

A moon cycle later, his father was banished for "unworthy behaviour towards a dragon of a higher order." But Igneel never found that out until he was much, much older.


	2. Iconoclasm

Iconoclasm: the deliberate destruction of a culture's own religious beliefs.

Igneel grew up believing that dragons were gods of the world. If the autumn dragon was to die, so would autumn. If the chalk hill dragon was to grow sick, so would the chalk hills.

That was, until the day he and his nest mates were given The Talk.

Not The Talk, the other Talk, the one that was about learning their affinities and earning their titles.

Igneel was in a state of shock for many days, as all younglings did when they learned that the world was different to what they had originally believed. But it did not last long- after all; he was a particularly resilient dragon.

Soon he was asking every dragon that visited the nursery what their first name was.

The dragon of birth was called Hellon. The Warm Breath's first name had been Mander.

His nest mates had become very excited, because with the talk, also came the fact that you were leaving. Soon the nursery would be behind them and they would be going into the world. To learn their talents! They cried happily. To earn their titles!

Star dragon parent's did not become involved in their own young's lives. Instead they gave their eggs dutifully away to the nurseries that dotted throughout the dragon colonies. The logic was solid, leave the rearing of the next generation to the dragons whose affinities were to caring for the young (to which there was not a lot of, since caring for the young was more of a moon dragon talent).

Soon the time of cast-off came closer. The day when the young dragons were deemed old enough to leave the nursery and take the world on by themselves. When they had been young, they had watched the older nests fly out (for the very first time with no cave ceiling to hinder their somersaults) with a dread that steamed from the depth of their guts. They did not want to leave! Their hides were not thick enough to last the winters without the warmth of the adult dragons. Their teeth had not grown in! They would not be able to last in the _outside_…

That was what it was to all the children in the nursery, a whole strange world that they had never, never stepped toe in. They had come as eggs, incubated and hatched, tended to when young and slowly left to their own devices as they grew.

Igneel had come later, he had lived outside. He only had one memory of the place, of _outside_.

The ferocious dragon, blackening the sun and deifying the light.

Igneel was no more prepared and no less afraid then the rest of his nest. They started to receive visitors who taught them things, like what words meant and how to run fast without tripping over your own tail.

They never taught you how to fly, no matter how hard ever single generation pleaded; you had to figure that one out for yourself.

Every dragon remembers the way you burned in sympathy for the ones that cannot manage to fly out on their cast-off day. They drop…too many, nearly one in every five drop…Igneel doesn't know what they fall down towards, but he likes to think there is a ledge to catch them.

They got older, and when they watched the cast-offs, they started to envy the freedom those dragons were finally getting. They wanted so bad to be able to leave the crowded cave and see the world. When a dragon dropped, they would instead snigger along with the older half of the nursery.

Their day rose, and could you image? The fear yet the excitement that coursed through them as they prepared silently, shoulder to shoulder. There was a comfort in that, they were all together.

Shoulder to shoulder.

The final hurrah.

Markett, Jou, Thimble, Ulric, Brom, Guise and Igneel. This was their nest, a band of brotherhood that lasted through the ugly fights of childhood and spats of their teething stages. The dragon of yolk had been pleasantly surprised at their friendship. She told them that most nests were divided in half, the dominate and the submissive. She thinks it is a very nice surprise. Very unusual in dragon nests.

The ceremony started. All the nests that lines the cave walls had wide eyed heads poking out of them. The alpha of the nursery, the dragon of the young, stood between the cave's tantalizing mouth and them.

"You are leaving, to never come back, you must soar, or fall, you are going to find, you might not survive."

They all new the familiar speech off my heart, but the words made them pulse with a different type of energy this time. This times, it was about them.

With a spread of her tattered, unused wings, the dragon of the young said,

"you are dragon."

Igneel felt shivers of thrill go down his scales. But it was for a different reason than the others.

Because that had just been the first time a dragon had referred to him as simply 'dragon'. No star or young or earth or strange dragon.

Just dragon, one almighty beast. He is, they are, we have always been. Dragon.

Slowly, like they were wading through a gravel bed, they lined up at the cave mouth and got their first view of the outside.

While the others were gazing up and up and up and 'where is the world's ceiling? The sky never ends!' Igneel was looking down.

There was no ledge, there never had been. Only the cracked surface of the desert that stretched out far below the high cave mouth.

And all the bones.

Igneel liked to think it was the bones of the meals that the nursery dragons feed them with, but, from a very young age, they had been told that no part was to be wasted. And bones happened to be a dragon's favourite part of the corpse.

Igneel waited, there was one more part of the ceremony still to go.

All the adult dragons of the nursery were gathered behind them, dwarfing the small bodies of his brothers and himself.

"You are on your own, discover the world for your own, only dare return to the dragon colony when you have fully grown strong. Never return unless you know the answer to the questions," the dragon of the young drew in her deepest breath.

"What is your affinity? What is your name?" All the adult dragons roared and stamped their feet. The noise continued to echo down the cave and out across the unbroken desert.

"Your search starts here, we have raised you, and we will give you your first clues. We have noticed talents you don't realise you have, we have known you since before you knew yourselves."

Every dragon there sucked in a breath. Now! Now was the time every hatchling dreamed off. Not the flight, the flight was terrifying, but what was said just before.

Who are my parents? Who am I?

Hatchlings were never told who their parents were until they were standing with their claws over the edge of the cave.

"Are your claws on the edge?" the alpha growled. The small line shuffled as the young dragons fearfully stood so close to the edge their claws were hanging over nothing but wind and nothing again.

None of them moves a muscle, you were meant to be frozen and still during most of the ceremony. A dragon was calm, he was control.

"Brom, child of Razor and Mother Glare, we observed that your tears are made of acid."

How had the adults learnt that? They didn't even know that, hell, Brom didn't even know that! He had always been the cry baby, teased because he cried rivers when he was hurt, but also cried whenever they fought. Now it made sense, his body knew that his tears were weapons and adrenaline was a trigger to shed them. It also explained why they always ended up scorched and burnt even though they never used fire when they fought.

"Guise, child of the dragon of prophesies and the starlit dragon, we observed your ability to walk in others dreams."

They had guessed he was a bad sleep walker or something of the sort when the adults made him sleep with a magical necklace, but this? This just seemed too unreal. Igneel was wondering if his own ability was going to be as fantastic. Oh, what would it be? Had they noticed his ability to command fire? No, they only told you of abilities that you had not noticed on your own.

"Jou, the child to the dragon of sunrise and the dragon of war, we observed that you could transfer your own strength to others unknowingly."

Igneel was like a statue, but inside he was bursting with pride. Of course! Of course! How had he not noticed, he had been on the receiving end of the buzz of power that being Jou's team mate in a play battle enabled you. Why had they never realised? Because they were only young, Igneel realised, they had just thought it was normal and had never said a word to Jou, just teased him like young boys did for always tiring first in the battles but always being on the winning team.

"Markett," the alpha rumbled. "Child of the Razor dragon and Mother Glare, we observed your ability to slice with the power of though when you were enraged."

Igneel nearly made the mistake of turning and looking at the faces of his nest mates when that was said. Slice with the power of though? So, so, so, so, so cool.

But, more importantly… Markett and Brom as real life brothers? They looked nothing a like!

"Thimble, child of the burning dragon and the dragon of the shine, we observed that your ever constant flames are much stronger than the usual fire dragon's and cannot be extinguisher by the usual means."

Special super flames? Igneel shivered, his nest was all so cool! Thimble and himself had always been the closest and Igneel knew the boy dragon did not need the ego boost that the alpha of the nursery was giving him.

"Ulric, child of Razor and Mother Glare, we observed your ability to heal far faster than any other dragon."

Damn, regeneration was considered one of the purest skills a dragon could have. So Ulric, Markett and Brom were all brothers, how did that work when they were all so different.

Igneel swallowed, there was only him left. At the cast-off the nests were usually addressed in alphabetical order, but Igneel had guessed that he would be left to the end because of his "lower" status.

"Igneel, child of the dragon of remedies and the dragon of decay, we observed your ability to lead others."

He had not expected the lamest ever ability, but he didn't take the time to dwell on it, he was too busy being mesmerised by the genuine warmth in the alpha dragon's voice as she regarded him and the sound of his parents names. The dragon of remedies and the dragon of decay...he never would have guessed in a lifetime.

"The winds outside the cave are jet-streamed, you can try to stay together or even regroup, but it will be impossible to control where the wind takes you- which will definitely be in all directions- and with no landmarks you have nowhere to meet. You are now truly going to be on your own."

"Raise your wings!" The alpha shouted to the nursery. Every raised their wings, even the newborns who had yet to figure out the science of walking. Igneel and his nest mates stood on the precipice of change, their entire bodies shaking, with their parent's names in their heads, the alpha's departing compliment and also the view of nothing but blue.

And blue.

And more blue.

"Fly!" the alpha screeched to them, the end of her roar becoming lost in the howl of hundreds of dragon's wings being flapped at the same time. The young, small wings did not make much difference, but with all the towering adults lined up behind them and their earth spanning wings, Igneel and his nest mate's wings were ripped up by the force and thrown into the sky.

All of them squeaked and rolled up into the air, clumsily trying to grasp the new concepts of wind and open space.

As they were ripped up towards the whisked clouds, the old alpha roared after them like she did every cast-off.

"Never return unless you know the answer to this question. What is your affinity? What is your name?"

Igneel watched his nest mate's even out as they flew, helplessly, apart.

Not one of them fell.

Igneel had made sure to sneak his nest out at night, and have them learn together how to fly around the jagged stones and stagnant pools in the very depth of the nursery cave.

He had made sure no one would drop.

Igneel had taken care of them, but now they would probably never meet each other again. After all, only one in one hundred survived this next stage.

The stage of abandonment.


End file.
